1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a photoelectric transducer apparatus and, more particularly, to a photoelectric transducer apparatus having a plurality of photoelectric transducer elements each having a capacitor electrode on a control electrode region of a corresponding semiconductor transistor.
2. Related Background Art
A TV or SV camera with an image sensor such as a CCD or MOS sensor has an aperture mechanism. Photoelectric transducer apparatuses each having a TV or SV camera with an automatic aperture mechanism are described in Japanese Patent Disclosure (Kokai) Nos. 12759/1985 to 12765/1985.
This photoelectric transducer apparatus includes a photosensor having a plurality of sensor cells each having a capacitor formed on a control electrode of a corresponding semiconductor transistor.
In the conventional photoelectric transducer apparatus described above, noise is often mixed in an output signal read out from the photosensor cells due to variations in dark voltage generated in the cells within arbitrary store time.
An output signal corresponding to the dark current component generated within the photosensor cell is prestored as reference optical information in an external memory in a conventional apparatus. A reference output signal derived from the reference optical information and an output signal from the actual optical information read out from the photosensor cell are compared with each other, and the output signal of the actual optical information is corrected, thereby eliminating the noise component caused by the dark voltage.
In the conventional photoelectric transducer apparatus described above, in order to constitute a photoelectric transducer system, the resultant system is undesirably complicated since a separate external circuit including a noise removal memory is required.
When a conventional photoelectric transducer apparatus is applied to a video camera or the like, the following problem occurs. When photoelectric transducer cells are arranged in a two-dimensional matrix and scanned in the vertical and horizontal directions, holes are stored in the base of each photoelectric transducer cell in a store mode upon reception of strong light. The base potential is forward-biased with respect to the emitter potential. The potential of a vertical line connected to the emitter electrode of each photoelectric transducer cell receiving strong light is increased to cause a blooming phenomenon. In order to prevent this, it is proposed that the vertical lines are grounded for a period excluding the readout operation, thereby refreshing the charge overflowed onto the vertical line. However, the vertical line can be grounded for only the horizontal blanking period, i.e., about 10 .mu.s. Therefore, the charge overflowed onto the vertical line during the horizontal scanning period still causes the blooming phenomenon.
In the readout mode, when imade signals are sequentially output by horizontal scanning after they are stored in a vertical line, a dummy signal is generated during the store of the signal in the vertical line. In other words, a smear phenomenon occurs.
In addition, the period for performing the refresh operation in the conventional apparatus is about 10 .mu.s in the horizontal blanking period. The refresh time is short to result in incomplete refreshing and hence an after image phenomenon.
Furthermore, assume that when the conventional photoelectric transducer apparatus is used as a single-plate type solid-state imaging device in a color television video camera, color filters are deposited or adhered onto the pixels. If an alignment scheme such as a Bayer alignment is used to form vertical lines in units of colors, i.e., R, G, and B, at least two vertical lines are required for the pixels of each column. In this case, since the vertical line portion does not serve as the photosensitive portion, the light-receiving area is reduced by the two vertical lines for each column. In other words, the opening of the aperture is undesirably reduced.
In a conventional photosensitive transducer apparatus, negative and positive voltages are required to bias an output amplifier, and the constitution is thus complicated. It is difficult to read out the signal component without degrading the frequency characteristics.